Utility meters are used to monitor the consumption of a utility-delivered commodity, such as, gas, water and/or electricity. The consumption information generated by a utility meter is typically used for billing purposes. For example, in its simplest form, a utility meter detects consumption and records a value representative of a total consumption over time. The consumer of the commodity is billed in proportion to the customer's usage of the commodity as measured by the meter.
Accordingly, one of the goals of electricity metering is to accurately measure the use or consumption of electrical energy resources. With such measurements, the cost of generating and delivering electricity may be allocated among consumers in relatively logical manner. Another goal of electricity metering is help identify electrical energy generation and delivery needs. For example, cumulative electricity consumption measurements for a service area can help determine the appropriate sizing of transformers and other equipment. Such goals apply similarly to gas and water metering.
In order to study energy usage patterns, and in some circumstances, adjust billing practices appropriately, it is sometimes advantageous to log commodity consumption as a function of time. In electricity metering, this practice is known as load profiling. A load profiling meter stores a series of records identifying one or more metered quantities and a time of day in which the metered quantity was consumed. For example, a load-profiling electricity meter may record and store energy consumption (i.e. watt-hrs), average power, apparent energy consumption (VA-hrs) and amp-hours for each fifteen minute interval in time. The resulting load profile data is stored in a memory, preferably non-volatile memory, within the meter. The meter may communicate the load profile data log to a utility computer by either remote transmission, or through a local connection. Once the load profile data is transferred from the meter, the data may be erased or overwritten within the meter.
Although meters and load profiling systems are designed such that load profile data can be erased from the meter periodically, the storage of load profile data can still require significant amounts of memory. Presently, it is common for meters to generate metering values of up to 32 bits. Storing 32 bit values for multiple quantities every five to fifteen minutes, along with appropriate time and date stamps, can consume substantial memory over the course of time, for example, a month. In addition to the memory requirements, the transfer of such data can occupy significant bandwidth. Accordingly, there is a need to ease the memory requirement and transmission requirements to carry out load profiling.